Main Cast: Robert Taylor, Richard Todd, Dana Wynter, Edmond O'Brien, John Williams
Release Year: 1956
Country: US
Run Time: 106 minutes
Plot
We don't see much of Omaha Beach in D-Day, the Sixth of June. Instead, the film concentrates on a romantic triangle involving American officer Robert Taylor, British officer Richard Todd and the lovely Dana Wynter. Taylor and Todd spend the last hours before D-Day reminiscing about Wynter. The romantic dilemma is eventually solved shortly after the invasion, when one of the men conveniently steps on a land mine. Lionel Shapiro's novel was geared more for the beach-and-bonbons crowd than war buffs, and the film follows suit. 20th Century-Fox gives a far more thorough account of D-Day itself in 1963's The Longest Day. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
Henry Koster was a seemingly improbable choice to direct D-Day The Sixth Of June -- although he'd worked in several different film categories in a career dating back 25 years, including religious melodrama, fantasy, and drama, his greatest success was as a maker of comedies, usually built around younger female protagonists such as Deanna Durbin et al. That said, he does an amazingly good job with a movie that is told almost entirely in flashbacks from the early morning hours of June 6th, 1944, aboard a ship sent in ahead of the first units of the main invasion force. Koster knew how to use the CinemaScope frame better than almost anyone in Hollywood, having helmed Fox's debut widescreen entry, The Robe (1953). D-Day The Sixth Of June is filled with beautifully composed shots: The close-ups of Robert Taylor and Dana Wynter in their first lunch together, with a violinist joining the shot for a moment of comic relief; Taylor and Wynter by the river as the ships move past, which is also exquisitely lit; the reunion between Taylor and Wynter 54 minutes into the movie; Taylor and Wynter kissing against a backdrop of barbed wire on the British coast; and Taylor and Wynter's farewell; the sequence in the Brigadier's home, with actor John Williams on the extreme left the frame at the dramatic nexus of the scene, with Wynter on the extreme right; the scene in which Edmond O'Brien's rival enters O'Brien's office, only the eagle shoulder insignia visible, instantly telling us of his new promotion and the end of thetwo officers' bitter rivalry; and most of the battle scenes. Indeed, Koster and cinematographer Lee Garmes did their jobs so well in creating a solid, substantial CinemaScope release, that D-Day The Sixth Of June proved impossible to appreciate in the decades of television showings that have followed, its image heavily cropped. In that regard, the DVD release is a godsend. The movie has its flaws, to be sure, including the 19 year age difference between Taylor and Wynter and the fact that Taylor, by the time of the D-Day invasion, with three years of soldiering behind his character, looks like the oldest captain in the United States Army. On the plus side, the script does capture the genuine ambivalence of the British to the presence of the Americans as they began arriving in 1942, and has the temerity to mention such unmitigated disasters as the raid on Dieppe (which nearly sank Churchill's government); and it delves into the darker side of the motivations behind some of the Americans serving in England, including the desire for personal aggrandizement and glory-hunting. The irony is that D-Day The Sixth of June is an infinitely better account of the two and a half years leading up to the invasion, than it is of the invasion. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
Jerry Paris - Raymond Boyce; Robert Gist - Dan Stenick; Richard Stapley - David Archer; Ross Elliott - Maj. Mills; Alex Finlayson - Col. Harkens; Cyril Delevanti - Coat Room Attendant; Marie Brown - Georgina; Rama Bai - Mala; Dabbs Greer - Atkinson; George Pelling - Capt. Waller; Conrad Feia - Lieutenant at Party; Boyd "Red" Morgan - Sgt. Brooks; Richard Aherne - Grainger; Pat McMahon - Suzette; John Damler - Lt. Col. Cantrell; Thomas Brown Henry - Gen. Bolthouse; Damian O'Flynn - Gen. Pike; Ben Wright - Gen. Millensbeck; Queenie Leonard - Corporal; Howard Price - American War Correspondent; Chet Marshall - Lt. Clayford Binns; Parley Baer - Sgt. Gerbert; Ashley Cowan - Lance Corp. Bailey; June Mitchell - Waitress; Geoffrey Steele - Maj. McEwen
A few hours before D-Day, Special Force Six embarks to destroy an especially well-defended German gun emplacement on the Normandy coast. As the ship steams towards it, the officers and men recall what circumstances brought them there, especially Wynter and Parker.
Captain Brad Parker, an American paratrooper invalided out because of a broken leg suffered during a parachute jump is posted to the headquarters of the European Theatre of Operations in London. At the Red Cross club, he meets and, despite being married, falls in love with Valerie Russell a Women's Royal Army Corpssubaltern. Valerie is the daughter of a crusty Brigadier who's been on sick leave since being wounded at Dunkirk. Valerie is also already in love with Captain John Wynter of the British Commandos, a friend of her father.
Both officers are posted overseas, but later return. Parker has volunteered to join what becomes Special Force Six, to be led by his former commander, Lt. Colonel (now Colonel) Timmer.
With only a few hours before the operation is due to embark, Timmer goes to pieces (partly as a result of his earlier bad experiences in the failed Dieppe landing) and is arrested whilst drunk and breaking security. Wynter, now a Colonel, who has recovered from being badly wounded, is brought in to command the operation.
The operation is a success, despite several killed and wounded. Wynter is killed when he steps on a mine. Parker is badly wounded and evacuated.
In hospital, and due to be repatriated, he sees Valerie for the last time. She does not tell him that Wynter has been killed.
Though originally planned to be filmed in England with Jean Simmons as the female lead, The Sixth of June (the working title of the film) was made on the Fox backlot with naval scenes filmed at the Long Beach Naval Shipyard whilst the beach landing was made at Point Dume California.[3] Before the days of computer-generated imagery director Henry Koster had to make his landing look convincing on his limited budget with two LCVP's and eighty soldiers.[4] In the invasion scene soldiers running out of the two landing craft appear in front of a back projection scene of another take of the same scene giving the appearance of twice as many landing craft and soldiers as there actually were.
Unlike many American war filmsD-Day the Sixth of June presents the viewpoints of British characters and features Canadian troops in action. The film's microcosm version of the Normandy landings is a Point du Hoc type assault featuring an imaginary "Special Force Six" made up of British, American and Canadian troops in equal quantities. When Taylor's character is wounded it is Todd and the British and Canadians who destroy the big gun that is the force's objective.
Edmond O'Brien's character is relieved of command in a similarity to US Army Ranger Major Cleveland A Lytle. Lytle who was to command three companies of the 2nd Ranger Battalion in the assault at Point du Hoc heard that Free French sources reported the guns thought to be there had been removed. Lytle became quite vocal that the assault would be unnecessary and suicidal and was relieved of his command at the last minute by Provisional Ranger Force commander Colonel James Rudder.[5]Rudder felt that Lytle could not convicingly lead a force with a mission that he did not believe in.[6] Lytle was later transferred to the 90th Infantry Division where he was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross.[7]
